CAMP FIRES IN THE YUKON 119 



rams, whose color nearly merged with the snow back- 

 ground resting on a shelf three-fourths of the way 

 up the mountain. We looked over their horns 

 carefully and found two very large and perfect 

 heads, but as the hour was too late to begin a stalk, 

 we decided to try for them in the morning and 

 started back to camp. It was bitter cold and our 

 boots were frozen stiff as we rode toward our base ; 

 at intervals we walked in order to keep warm, only 

 to get into the saddle again after plowing our way 

 on foot through the heavy snow. 



About five o'clock we reached the willow patch, 

 unsaddled the horses, placed bells around their 

 necks, and turned them loose without hobbles, as it 

 was necessary to leave them unhampered to paw 

 down through the snow for such scanty feed as they 

 might be able to discover. We put on our parkies 

 with their fur-edged hoods, as the increasing cold 

 gripped us, and with a fire of willow sticks and sheep 

 fat managed to cook an evening meal; after which 

 we sat in the snow with our boots almost against the 

 small bed of coals and warmed and thawed out our 

 boots. The clear, still Arctic night came down 

 upon our pitiful camp; the jeweled lights of the 

 heavens seemed to sparkle from the night canopy 

 of deep blue no higher than the white, still peaks 

 that engulfed our hollow, as we looked upon the 

 firmament from our eiderdown sleeping robes 

 stretched upon the frozen couch of snow. 



